APPENDIX. A. DEPRECIATION OF PROVINCIAL CURRENCY. It would be impossible to obtain a correct idea of the prices paid in the purchase of lands, or in other pecuniary transactions mentioned in our story, previous to the year 1752, without taking into consideration the depreciation of the currency of the Province during that period. When lawful money is specified in the account, silver is to be understood; gold not having been made a legal tender until 1761, when a law to that effect was obtained after a long and bitter struggle. In 1690, in an emergency of the war then raging, the Province began the issue of treasury notes of the value of from five shillings to five pounds cach ; £40,000 in amount being emitted. Before the end of 1692, these bills depreciated at least one-third; but the General Court then made them a legal tender, and further enacted, that, in all public payments, they should be received at an advance of five per cent. By these means, the bills were restored to an equality with specie, and kept at par about twenty years. But, in 1703, the government, yielding to a popular clamor for an expansion of the currency, began a financial system upon that principle. The effects of this inflation upon the paper currency were, however, not very apparent until about 1712, when the government, being compelled to extend the period for the redemption of its notes, the public confidence in them was shaken, and they began steadily to depreciate, and continued to do so year by year. Previous to 1712, the bills passed at the value of eight shillings for an ounce of silver. The depreciation from that time is represented in the following table:— In 1737, the General Court, perceiving the impossibility of restoring credit to the swollen mass of its notes, resolved to issue others of a new form, or tenor, although not discontinuing the use of the old; and thus came into use the terms old and new tenor in speaking of the bills of the Province. The different forms of the two bills are given below: OLD TENOR. NO. 205. This Indented Bill of Twenty Shillings due from the Province of the Massachusetts Bay in New England to the Possessor thereof shall be in value equal to Money, and shall be accordingly accepted by the Treasurer and Receivers subordinate to him in all publick payments and for any Stock at any time in the Treasury Boston November the Twenty-first Anno 1702 By Order of the Great and General Court or Assembly This bill of Twenty Shillings due from the Province of the Massachusetts Bay in New England, to the possessor thereof, shall be in value equal to three ounces of coined silver, Troy weight, of sterling alloy, or gold coin at the rate of four pounds eighteen shillings per ounce; and shall be accordingly accepted by the Treasurer and receivers subordinate to him in all payments (the duties of Import and Tunnage of Shipping and incomes of the Light House only excepted,) and for any Stock at any time in the Treasury. Boston, By order of the Great and General Court or Assembly. TWENTY SHILLINGS TWENTY SHILLINGS Committee The law made one bill of the new tenor equal to three of the same denomination of the old; but the public passed them at the rate of one for four, and they depreciated together in that proportion. The old tenor continued the standard of value in ordinary usage. The ruinous financial policy of the Province was not begun or continued without strenuous opposition at home and still stronger in England; and when, in 1748, the mother country agreed to pay an idemnity of £183,000 towards the expenses incurred by New England in the capture of Louisburg, nearly the whole of it coming to Massachusetts, it was resolved to appropriate her proportion to the redemption of the paper money of the Province, at depreciated rates. This now amounted to £2,200,000; but had depreciated, says Hildreth, since the issue, full one-half, the whole depreciation being at the rate of seven or eight for one. In 1751, the specie for the Louisburg idemnity arrived, and the currency began to be redeemed at a rate about one-fifth less than its current value. It was enacted that future debts should be paid in silver, at the rate of 6s. 8d. the ounce. And treasury notes were not again issued by Massachusetts until the Revolution; although certificates of indebtedness were given by the treasury, and passed current, with more or less depreciation, among the people. But, though the Province paper in 1752 ceased to be a legal tender, an account by an officer of the treasury, in 1753, showed that £131,996, equal in value to £17,599 lawful money, were still in the hands of the people. The committee of the legislature had burnt bills, at the town-house in Boston, representing the amount of £1,792,236. 'On the 29th of January, 1754, Harrison Gray, the Provincial Treasurer, issued a notice that all bills still out must be brought to him for exchange by the first day of the next June, or be forfeited; and that any person subsequently passing them would be subject to a fine of £10 for each offence. This appears to have effectually disposed of both the old and new tenor. N. B. For the facts above given, we are indebted generally to the "Historical Account of Massachusetts Currency," by Joseph B. Felt, published in 1839,a valuable book, now out of print. B. REV. THOMAS ALLEN'S DIARY. DURING some of the most interesting years of the Revolution, Rev. Mr. Allen kept a pocket diary; in which from time to time occur minutes and memoranda, sometimes of curious and often of instructive interest. Of the information contained in many of these, we have made use in the text of this volume: others find more appropriate places in the Appendix. The book in which the diary is kept is itself of interest; being "Aitken's General American Register, and the Gentleman's and Tradesman's Complete Annual Ac count Book, and Calendar, For the Pocket or Desk; For the Year of our Lord 1773. Published at Philadelphia; by Joseph Crukshank, for R. Aitken, Bookseller, opposite the London Coffee-House, Front Street." The Preface states that this was the first book ever published in America. REVOLUTIONARY MARKET-PRICES. January, 1779. Wheat, twelve dollars per bushel. July, 1779. New-England Rum, thirty dollars per gallon. Bohea Tea, ten dollars per pound. Brown Sugar, three dollars per pound. Wheat, forty dollars per bushel. Corn (Indian), twenty dollars per bushel. 1780. Wheat, one hundred and ten dollars per bushel, or 9s. silver. Bohea Tea, 12s. silver; 140 dollars Continental currency. PRICES OF SOME OF THE ARTICLES AND NECESSARIES OF LIFE. MR. ALLEN'S LOANS TO THE CONTINENT. Value of my Continental certificates as stated by Loan Office treasurer: 11th June, 1777, of three hundred dollars, is........ 19th Jan., 1778, of two hundred dollars.... 17th March, 1778, of two hundred dollars, is. Connecticut... 300 200 106.36.0 606.36 |